


with greatness thrust upon them

by portions_forfox



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M, alternative universe, not even the alternate universe you're thinking of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-04
Updated: 2013-03-04
Packaged: 2017-12-04 06:35:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/707655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/portions_forfox/pseuds/portions_forfox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are only two people in this entire universe (and probably the next one over) who’ve ever even heard of the Doctor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	with greatness thrust upon them

**Author's Note:**

  * For [somebraveapollo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/somebraveapollo/gifts).



> written for [somebraveapollo](http://somebraveapollo.livejournal.com)'s prompt at [magisterequitum](http://magisterequitum.livejournal.com)'s fix-it ficathon. prompt was for martha/shakespeare, _he finds her, and stays._ this is technically between an alt!martha and an alt!shakespeare in what is _literally_ an AU.

In this world, he goes by Will and he’s won Best Screenplay at the Oscars four out of the past five years. He lost once, purely on the basis that he didn’t write anything that year, electing instead to spend what was supposed to be one summer which turned into two in Berlin with a Calvin Klein boy toy which turned out to be five. Tarantino nearly wept from sheer relief.

William Shakespeare is the most revered screenwriter in modern history, younger than Damon and Affleck when his first film was picked up.

He is far too smart for his own good.

That part’s the same, either way.

 

 

 

There’s only one person in this entire universe (and probably the next one over) who knows as much as he does, and her name is Martha Jones. She’s a producer and a lady, never married and high-heeled.

They first meet at a party in some actor’s West End loft, clinking glasses and low-slung lights, the neck of her dress dipping low and the curve of his smile arching high.

He tilts his head at her, “Have we met before?”

She smiles serenely, dry and bleak, and touches the tip of her glass to the tip of his; her painted fingers long. “Probably,” she says.

 

 

 

“Alice,” Will whispers, “who is that?” And he gestures across the room, curved finger, dropped hip.

“That?” she gasps, eyebrows shooting up. “That’s Martha Jones! Haven’t you heard of her, Will?”

“I’ve heard of her,” he answers, tipping the ring of his glass into his open lips, smooth sparkling champagne pouring down his throat—“Who hasn’t?”

 

 

 

She’s walking out of the studio with her sunglasses on and her car keys and a coffee and a cigarette, all balanced in just two perfectly-manicured hands, and when she looks up in the parking lot she sees Shakespeare in his ridiculous impractical convertible, his dark hair tousled and the stubble round his mouth.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she demands of him, disgruntled.

“I’ve been working on something,” he tells her, his elbow leaning on the door of his car, his other hand resting loosely on the steering wheel. “I want you to have the rights.”

She straightens up, holds her key closer to her chest and yanks the cigarette out of her mouth. “Normally we have business meetings for this sort of thing,” she informs him, this biting edge to her voice he hasn’t heard from anyone in a long time (oh, the woes of kinghood). He finds he rather likes it.

“Oh, why bother with that rubbish?” he laughs. “We both know I could write a Taft biopic hinging on the tragedy of his not fitting in a bathtub and it would _still_ sell more than James Cameron directing the bloody Hunger Games.” He sighs, taps his fingers on the car door in an anxious rhythm. “Business meetings, my arse. I’ve got every producer from every big studio practically kneeling at my feet.”

“So then why are you giving it to me?” she snaps, flicking the wrist holding the cigarette—some of the ash hits his arm (he suspects not entirely by accident).

“Because,” he says, that wicked grin—“I like you.”

 

 

 

“I don’t like you,” she says over dinner, fancy restaurant, VIP room, the chandelier hanging low. “I don’t like you one measly bit, William Shakespeare.”

“Please,” he smirks, pouring wine into her glass with ease, “William Shakespeare is my father. Call me Will.”

“I’ll call you what I like,” she mumbles, indignant, and wrestles in her purse for a cigarette. It’s one of the few places left in London you can still smoke, and it’s mainly for actors and writers and big wigs. _The show biz people_ , waiters say with contempt.

“Have it your way,” he laughs, leaning back in his chair. “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”

She scoffs, an eye-roll. “I don’t like you.”

“I’m sorry to say I can’t say the same.”

“Oh is that right?” Martha wonders, sardonic eyebrows, legs crossed away from him and her elbow on the table. The pearls of her necklace dip down to the plane of her chest, and the diamonds on her wrist clink against the dark oak table. A bit of a rougher accent starts to bleed through when she’s bothered, and it rather makes Will want to bother her, a lot. She leans forward, narrowed eyes. “And why is that, William Shakespeare?” Taps the ash from her cigarette into the ashtray without breaking eye contact. “Why do you like me so?”

He leans forward, his eyes glinting and his teeth visible under the excited curl of his slim white smile—“Because,” he whispers, hushed, “you’re _clever_. You’re clever like me.” He leans even further in, so his breath is warm against her face and his eyes are twinkling in her gaze, so she has no choice but to drop her stare to his lips, his mouth open in one conciliatory phrase: “You know there’s more out there than this.”

She swallows once, and he grins. “You and I,” he tells her. “We’re destined for great things.”

She shifts away slightly. Frowns. “Who says we’re not already there?” she wants to know.

He leans back and lets out his breath, satisfied. “I don’t know,” he says. “Can’t you feel it?” and he cracks his knuckles above his head. “We do, I guess.”

 

 

 

“Martha,” he says into her bare shoulder, standing too close to her back as she unlocks the door to her apartment, steady-fingered, “have you ever heard of the Doctor?”

“Oh, sure,” she slithers, turning around and pressing a hot open-mouthed kiss to his lips. “Who hasn’t?”

 


End file.
